This is my first published article and the first piece of writing that I’ve actually been paid for! Cheers!!

At 6-foot-4 and 270 pounds, Rod Harrison was not a person you’d ever want to fuck with. People literally crossed the street when they saw his hulking figure walking up the sidewalk. He stepped into my life when I was 7, looming larger than life. My mom often recounted the first time she saw him back in high school, delivering a lightning-fast round kick to the temple of a classmate who dared challenge him.

He was a highly gifted martial artist and an accomplished street thug, mostly defending his turf from rival drug dealers. He took on all comers, from a pack of Hells Angels to swarms of angry cops trying to cuff him. Being a father to two young children was the last thing you’d imagine Rod doing, and yet, there he was, sitting on the kitchen floor with my little sis and me, showing us how to color inside the lines.

He had a movie-star smile, a quick wit and a contagious laugh that drew people to him effortlessly. He was frighteningly charismatic, with a brilliant, sharp mind, a dangerous combination for a criminal. Rod organized a small crew of outlaws and began home-invasion robberies of drug dealers. He and his crew didn’t hesitate to resort to violence, pistol-whipping their victims to shake the drugs and money loose. Soon, they graduated to hitting banks, jewelry stores and pharmacies, with my mom often driving the getaway car. Later, she’d collect newspaper clippings of their exploits for our family scrapbook.

I’ve got several intellectual properties in various stages of development at the moment. This one is along the lines of what you’d see on Adult Swim or primetime on Fox. Right now it exists as a web-comic series (launched Aug. 26, 2014) and there have been a couple animated viral videos floating around since 2013.

THE SHOW IN A NUTSHELL:

Sonny & Sons is a handyman business in upstate New York that has just become a Reality TV show. The show stars Sonny and his sons, Sonny Jr. and Sonny III, along with a never-ending stream of unusual characters/customers that they interact with every day. Sonny’s ex-wife Sunny is also an important character in the show. She and her new husband Sammy run a business that coincidentally(?) competes directly with Sonny & Sons Handyman Service.

THEIR BUSINESS:

A handyman is a person skilled at a wide range of repairs, typically around the home. These tasks include troubleshooting skills, repair work, maintenance work (both interior and exterior) and are sometimes described as “odd jobs” or “fix-it tasks” which includes: light plumbing jobs, such as fixing a leaky toilet, or light electric jobs, such as changing a light fixture – both of which can be extremely dangerous if not performed by someone with many years of experience and training.

Copy Cat! has been in development on and off now for 2 years. I pitched the show twice to Nickeleodeon, once for the shorts program and once as a series. They passed on it. I also ran it by someone at Cartoon Network who thought the show looked “too Nick” for them, which is great because I created it with Nick in mind. SMH

So far, I’ve got half a dozen episodes written and ready to go and ideas for another dozen or so. After much encouragement from friends and family, I’ve decided to launch a web comic series with these lovable characters to keep the juices flowing and to hopefully create a fan base – the Copy Cat! Facebook page has nearly 600 fans, which is cool because I haven’t really promoted this much online.

My friend Hector Navarro is doing the art and I’m doing the writing, we officially launched the web comic on Sept. 1, 2014 — gets see how long we can keep this thing going!

ODDJOBS™ is an idea I’ve been stewing on for 20 years, never was quite sure what to do with it. My dad used to draw little furry characters like these when he was a kid. When I was a kid, he would draw them for me – putting them on my birthday cards, christmas cards or notes he left for me around the house.

When I started working at Nickelodeon in 2005, I began coming up with show ideas that I could pitch to the network. This one would seem like a no-brainer, cuz they’re so damn cute, but I wasn’t quite sure how to write stories for these little guys, so I kept it on the back burner for a couple years.

Then, one day it hit me. A flash flood of ideas for the ODDJOBS™ world. I’ve pitched the show 3 times to Nickelodeon and once to Dreamworks TV, gotten some great input and am still in the process of fine tuning it. I’m aiming it at the youngest demographic but think it will appeal to older kids (and even some adults). I want it to be fun and entertaining for kids and something that parents can at least tolerate (some kids shows are unwatchable for adults).

Another development in the last 2 years is that I’m working on designing ODDJOBS™ toys. I’ve made a few prototypes and keep tweaking them. Hoping to find just the right design soon and take the leap into manufacturing.

On April 20, 2013, I premiered an early internet version of my newest short film. Produced with my brothers C. J. Kinyon and C. C. Kinyon, the bulk of the film was shot on location at a long-abandoned, notoriously haunted cemetery in Half Moon Bay, CA. – legend has it that the cemetery can’t be located unless you are shown by a person who has once visited, and in our case, that proved true. The final version of the film is currently being submitted to film festivals across the U.S. and I’m hoping to arrange an official premiere in 2014.

On August 23, 2007, I released a full length CD of parody songs I had written and produced, all inspired by a webcomic I had been publishing for a year or so. The first CD by The Jimi Homeless Experience was released on the exact day of the 40th anniversary of Jimi Hendrix’ first album release Are You Experienced, my Are You Homeless? features “Weird Al” Yankovic-styled parodies of some of Hendrix’ biggest hits. In 2009 a follow-up EP was released featuring a parody of the Hendrix hit “Red House” and a heavy blues/rock cover of the classic blues song “Good Morning Little Schoolgirl”. Various lineups of the band have been playing live at venues all over Southern CA. since 2007. In the latest incarnation, I am playing the part of Jimi.

[click to read comix]

Stop Motion Animation and Webcomic

On March 6, 2008, I was honored as the first “featured animator” on MyToons.com, which was a brand new YouTube-styled website specifically geared for 2-D and 3-D animation. My stop-motion clay animation which caught the site’s attention parodied Jimi Hendrix’ key performance at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival. The piece features a fictional character named Jimi Homeless who first appeared in a series of webcomics published as The Jimi Homeless Experience (webcomic). The webcomics were written by me and drawn by my friend and underground cartoonist known only as Big Tasty.

This was one of my crazier ideas, and like most, it started out as a simple joke. A friend and I were working on a screenplay for a comedy film called, “Six Million Dollar Manson” — Charlie Manson is in prison and his limbs get caught in a license plate pressing machine, the doctors rush in to save him and give him bionic arms and legs… you get the gist. Anyway, I came up with the idea that he should be running a business out of his cell in his spare time, making salad dressing called “Spahn Ranch Dressing”, which sells like hotcakes to his weirdo fans, eventually spawning an industry of commercial products made by incarcerated serial killers. One thing led to another and I began looking into ways I could manufacture and distribute this salad dressing in the real world. Eventually, I decided against it, but not before making some funny commercials for the product. I put these up on YouTube and wound up getting more than 120,000 views on them.